"People use the horn pointlessly. It's annoying," says Eva KC, a banker, who commutes to work on a red Honda scooter. "The micro buses are the worst. They seem to be in a race with one another and will honk away as if doing so will magically clear the roads," she adds, echoing the voices of many riders and drivers around town.
There is growing evidence that noise pollution is not just annoying but has many adverse health effects too. Progressive hearing loss aside, various studies have shown that noise is perceived as a danger signal and the body reacts with a fight or flight response with nervous, vascular, and hormonal changes that have severe health repercussions. This is the reason why honking isn't allowed in school and hospital areas. All that noise adds to the stress levels of children and ill patients.
Dr J P Jaiswal, cardiologist at Norvic International Hospital, says that excessive exposure to noise leads to many health issues. From losing consciousness to chronic heart diseases, the risks are aplenty. But because noise doesn't pose an immediate threat to health, people tend to ignore it and even when the symptoms manifest they don't realize that noise could be the causative agent.
"The issue shouldn't be taken lightly and in this case, prevention is definitely better, not to mention a whole lot easier, than cure," says Dr Jaiswal adding that controlling road traffic noise by limiting horn usage would go a long way in curbing the health risks arising from noise
pollution.
According to DIG Keshab Adhikari, the limit for horns should be between 26-30 decibels but right now the vehicles in Kathmandu valley use horns of magnitudes larger than 100 decibels. "A while ago we had tried to control the use of horns, especially pressure horns. We fined many vehicles but then the transport entrepreneurs protested and it all fizzled out from there on," says Adhikari expressing his disappointment over the fact that reducing traffic noise wasn't considered as essential as some of the other campaigns run by the Metropolitan Traffic Police Department (MTPD).
Deepak Kumar Napi, 60, has been driving a taxi in the capital for the last 40 years. From eight in the morning to seven in the evening, he's out on the roads. Napi claims to use the horn as sparingly as possible and wishes other did so too because after a point, all the tooting and blaring gets immensely tiresome, so much so that Napi claims to frequently suffer from terrible headaches.
"The minute there is a jam or a vehicle slows down, the honking starts. Your vehicle won't sprout wings and fly just because you are impatient and choose to exhibit it as loudly as possible," says a frustrated Napi as he slows down to demonstrate what he means and the bus behind him starts honking right away.
"If people started getting fined heavily for using horns unnecessarily, then maybe they would use it less often or stop altogether," says Napi who believes that the use of horns should actually be banned altogether. "While the traffic police are focusing on lane discipline and other traffic rule violations, they could very easily tackle this problem too. But the sad thing is they don't seem to be all that concerned," he adds.
But SP Kosh Raj Pokhrel, spokesperson at MTPD, begs to differ. He says that the MTPD is concerned about this issue and that they are doing what they can. Buses and large vehicles that use pressure horns in no horn areas are being fined and the vehicles' horns are also being removed on the spot, but Pokhrel also confesses that this campaign alone isn't enough to tackle the problem of road traffic noise.
"There has to be a strong law in place in order to make the roads of Kathmandu bearable in terms of noise. A hundred rupee fine isn't good enough," says SP Pokhrel who also has an interesting insight to share – he believes the reason why every vehicle driver resorts to using the horn excessively is because everybody in a rush and nobody slows down to let somebody else pass.
"The pedestrians cross roads wherever they want and usually run while doing so. Those on vehicles don't show any respect, neither for pedestrians nor other drivers. They need to pass by first, else it's the end of the world," he explains adding that every person out on the roads, be it on foot or on vehicles, needs to be a little more conscious of their actions.
However, public transport does seem to the major culprit for road traffic noise. Not that the other vehicles are any better, but the buses and tempos are in a different league altogether. Like KC said, there is an unstated competition taking place on the roads and they are armed with their weapons – the horns.
"What's wrong in using horns? How do we make the pedestrians and other vehicles aware of us if we don't honk?" exclaims a microbus driver upon being reprimanded by a passerby about all the unnecessary honking he was partaking in, even when his vehicle was at a stand still.
Another driver of a blue Hyundai car honked away to clear a crowd of people gathered in front of B & B hospital in Gwarko, Lalitpur. Despite a huge sign clearly stating the area to be a no horn zone, he had no qualms about honking away to disperse the crowd. When people were agitated, the driver got off and cursed them for their foolishness instead.
It is this insensitivity, this utter lack of common/civic sense that adds to the problem. If the traffic police could come up with a scheme – like the enormously successful anti-drunk driving campaign, and the recently enforced lane discipline – to tackle road traffic noise, specifically the use of horns, Kathmandu would be a lot quieter and the health hazards significantly lesser. But the setback in curbing this issue is that, it can't be tackled by enforcing laws alone. It falls on every individual to do their bit and make a genuine effort to get rid of their habit to use the horn every 30 seconds or less, if this matter is to be brought under control.
However, Dr Kabir Nath Yogi, the Prime Minister's physician, simply refused to address noise pollution as an environmental hazard. During a brief phone conversation, Dr Yogi denied to talk about the issue stating it's something an ENT doctor should handle, not a physician because noise pollution isn't an environmental hazard. Some young bikers when questioned about their habit of using the horns said it was fun to 'make some noise' on the streets.
It is this mindset of the authorities and the general public that is worrisome. This threat to environmental health is a growing problem that is unaddressed and will remain unaddressed for as long as people don't see the imminent threat noise poses. There needs to be a statutory limit to road traffic noise. But the thing is it's not even an issue – even those who crib and complain about all the noise can't seem to be bothered to take any action – and that's where the problem lies.
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